Memory & Decision Making

I study memory and decision making using a combination of cognitive psychology, neuroimaging, and computational modeling methods. I am particularly interested in what factors makes some experiences more memorable than others and how these influences can manifest in decision making.

Memory for past experiences can be used to inform future behavior. However, not all experiences are equally informative for future behavior–in part because some experiences are more memorable than others. Although many factors can influence memorability, it is well known that both emotion and reward influence memory. Their effects are often studied independently, but in my own work, I seek to advance our understanding of these distinct effects on memory, but also to investigate commonalities in their effects, with the goal of understanding domain-general modulation of memory for motivationally salient information. Although biases can provide insight into the functional role of memory, how these biases manifest in decision-making furthers demonstrate their importance.

I am also interested in developing better research methods, for more details on projects explicitly designed for methods development, see here.

An Introduction to MATLAB for Behavioral Researchers

Over the years I have trained many colleagues in using MATLAB for behavioral analyses. In doing so, I noticed many of the same issues arise, so I decided to write a book to guide people in learning MATLAB, beginning from no prior programmming experience. By using data from previously published papers and an incremental approach, I begin with the basics of conducting behavioral analyses in MATLAB to making publication-quality figures, writing your own functions, and advice on debugging. Some more advanced topics, such as basic eyetracking analyses, are also discussed.